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Issue 00416 |
April 22 - 29, 2006 |
issn 0856 - 9135 |
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Dark Side |
 Curses
of the new generation!By Valentine Marc Nkwame In the Seventies the fuss was all about those extra-high, platform shoes which used to be known here as 'Santana' a term probably derived from the name of that Rock and Roll Star, Carlos Santana. The shoes also known as 'Raizoni' which is the local term for 'Raised-on' were considered an outstanding status symbol for the local urban youth. Young people used to invest their entire first salaries in buying platform shoes then going for Tsh 400 per pair. To buy such a pair of 'Santana' shoes sometimes a guy had to save their three to six months salary wages, because in those days people used to start with a salary scale of about Tsh.50. A young man with a new pair of 'Santana' was guaranteed to take all the local girls in the neighborhood even if his pair of trousers were in tartars, or hasn't brushed his teeth for the last three months. Whenever a divorce, heart break or passionate murder took place in the 70s somehow it would also have something to do with those platform shoes. I still recall a local pop song belted by the then Tanga based Les Wanyika band. The singer was lamenting' " .... Mchumba wangu sasa hanitaki Eti kwa sababu Sina Santana ....." (... My girlfriend is now ditching me Just because I don't own a pair of Santana..) Later, that is in the eighties, the fashion mad rush was for the French made, Peugeot 504s, then dubbed as 'Mitumba,' because it was popularly believed that, the guys who owned such a vehicles, must have bought them second hand in Europe, where they had been working rather hard as either, street sweepers or toilet cleaners .... and maybe both. Garbage collectors or not, once the young fellows of the eighties managed to return home with those 504 Mitumbas. Everybody within a radius of 60 miles would worship them. The fact that those Peugeot vehicles were the first to have roof windows, made their owners to look like God's own incarnates on earth. Suddenly toilet cleaning became a very respectable job .... if practiced in Europe that is. The 80s saw some major murder disasters ever to occur in Arusha town. Guns were not very common then, therefore each killing was neatly done with assorted sharp knives, machetes, clubs (rungus) or the double edged swords known as 'Simis!' Apparently in each of such grisly incidents, a Peugeot 504 car would in one way or another be very much involved. Then came the 90s, this was when Television sets became the 'real things' all one needed was just a little 14 inched TV set in the house and all the world would be at his feet. It was also around this time when guns were discovered around here .... All you needed to hear was 'Bang!' to know that a TV set has just changed hands in town. The sets used to change hands in crude manners, the previous owner would either be maimed for life during the transaction or be dispatched to the next world altogether. Want to know the latest curse of the generation? Mobile phones! Last weekend a retired army officer Ally Mollel who used to be one of the local leaders at Olmatejo section of Ngarenaro, was on his way home with his wife when the Memsahib's phone rang. As she lifted it to her ears, a thug snatched the gadget from her hand and sped off. The husband followed the young thief in hot pursuit, but the breathless phone snatcher took out a sharp knife and slashed Mollel's stomach repeatedly. He died on the spot. The angry community of Olmatejo decided to conduct an extensive search, as we were going to press four suspected youths, had already faced the ultimate 'mob justice!' A few paces away at 'Kambi ya fisi' a huge battle was brewing. It was between two young ladies. Apparently one of them had just bought a new mobile phone handset and this development somehow irked the other party. This other party is alleged to have speculated rumors that, all young ladies who own cell phones normally obtain the gadgets by sleeping around with any creature .... and performing abortion afterwards. This latest claim is far more damaging than the 80's speculations about people cleaning toilets somewhere in Europe so that one could earn money to buy a used Peugeot car with a roof window. The result? Well until going to press the battle field at 'Kambi ya fisi' was still active. In fact, whenever a murder, a fight or any misunderstanding occurs in the locality of late, trust the mobile phones to have something to do with that. nkwame@gmail.com
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